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Oct 5, 2016

Wednesday, October 5, 2016 Julian Lim

Theme: GRAVITY, MAGNETISM and FRICTION, or MASS x ACCELERATION. The 2nd word of common two-word phrases combines with the word FORCE to indicate a body of people organized for a particular activity. I FORCED those physics related ideas on you, but will not apologize.

17 A. *Project with many obstacles : UPHILL TASK. Something difficult to accomplish. I suppose the referent here is Sisyphus. You might need some helpers to accomplish that thing - hence a TASK FORCE, an ad hoc group devoted to completing a specific assignment.

22 A. *E! talk show focused on celebrity outfits : FASHION POLICE. Clothing critics, and a TV show based on their commentary about the dress modes of celebrities. It's amazing how much time some people have on their hands. Police FORCES are units of government charged with the prevention or detection of crime and the maintenance of public order.

47 A. *Britannica, e.g. : REFERENCE WORK. A book or other repository of useful information. Many years ago I contributed a chapter on automotive plastics and elastomers to such a book. The WORK FORCE refers to people engaged in or available as labor within some geographic unit, industry, or business.

And the unifier -- 55 A. Team up ... or, literally, what the last words of the answers to starred clues can do : JOIN FORCES. As indicated in 17 A, to get together for some purpose. The target words JOIN with FORCE to fulfill the theme concept.

UPDATE --As was pointed out in comments, I missed the vertical theme entries. Mea culpa. Lo siento.21 D. *1997 movie partly set on a plane called the Jailbird : CONAIR. This gives us the AIR FORCE, a branch of the military with lots of air planes30. *High-speed skiing event, familiarly : SUPER G. Giving us G FORCE - the FORCE equivalent to a multiple of the natural force of gravitation due to high linear or angular acceleration.

Hi, Gang, JazzBumpa here, getting together with you to make our way through today's puzzle. Let's have at it.

Across

1. One of seven in "Jabberwocky" : STANZA. A nonsense poem include in Lewis Carroll's action-adventure novel Though The Looking Glass. You can read all 7 quatrains here.

7. Shabbat celebrant : JEW. Shabbat is the biblical day of rest, and the source of the English word sabbath. Rosh Hashana, the JEWish New Year celebration was from Sunday through Tuesday this week, so l'shana tova to all.

10. "Baby __": 2008 Fey/Poehler comedy : MAMA. A conflict comedy involving an adoptive mother and the surrogate mother she hires. That's more than I know about it.

28. Neighbor of Venezuela : GUYANA. A small, English-speaking country on the north coast of South America, nestled among Venezuela, Surinam, Brazil and the Atlantic Ocean, but culturally connected to the Caribbean Islands.

29. Discriminatory, as in hiring : SEXIST. One of several possible discrimination types. This one is gender based.

11. Cover story : ALIBI. A claim that you were not at a crime scene when the event took place

12. Copycat : MIMIC. One who lacks originality in thought and action.

13. Make things right : ATONE. Make amends. But will it erase hard feelings?

18. Course where tangents are relevant : TRIG. No indication that trigonometry should be abbreviated? This is not the sort of tangent off upon which one may go rambling, but rather the mathematic function that is equal to the ratio of the lengths of the sides opposite and adjacent to an angle in a right triangle.

21. *1997 movie partly set on a plane called the Jailbird : CONAIR.

If you're into that sort of a thing

22. Handy "Mr." : FIXIT. Home improvement and DIY maven. I do not qualify.

23. "Master of None" star __ Ansari : AZIZ. He also created and writes this Netflix series, the G-Man tells me.

24. "Law & Order" gp. : NYPD. New York Police Department, in custody of a chlecho.

30. *High-speed skiing event, familiarly : SUPER G. Set on a down hill course with widely set gates, with more turns than the down hill event, and greater speed than the giant slalom.

31. Discipline : TRADE. The only sense I can make of this is that one definition of "discipline" is "a branch of knowledge," and a trade is a job category requiring skills and training, so there is that kind of a connection. Still seems like a stretch. Do you think of plumbing as a discipline?

33. Capital of Belarus : MINSK. This city has existed for over 1000 years and now has a population over 2 million. Belarus is located east of Poland and south of Lithuania and Latvia.

Julian often leaves me out on a Lim, but today was a WOK in the park. I did get the theme, but like JzB, didn't notice that SUPER G was one of the theme answers. Nice puzzle, Julian. I didn't understand EMS until coming here. Thanx, JzB.

Even all these years later, GUYANA still seems synonymous with deranged cult leader Jim Jones in my mind.

I'm used to Julian's puzzles being on Saturday and very challenging. So it was nice to have his usual creativity with a more accessible Wednesday puzzle!WEES about SUPER G for G FORCE in the theme as well as CONAIR contributing AIR FORCE. So 3 across theme answers plus the reveal and 2 vertical theme answers.

An enjoyable Wednesday-level offering from Mr. Lim. Didn't understand Ems until coming here and I agree that Discipline/Trade is a stretch. It may be technically correct but it still grates. Small nit, though, in an otherwise perfectly fine puzzle. Never heard of "Wefie" but it makes as much sense as other present-day slang. Earl Grey is becoming as ubiquitous as Abejo's other CSO, Erie. And Malala is getting her share of recognition, deservedly so.

Thanks, Julian, for a mid-week workout and thanks, JzB, for your always entertaining and erudite expo.

I concur, this was an easier than usual Julian Lim puzzle. AZIZ was a total unknown and IRAISE as clued as well as WEFIE caused problems. Any time they form a huddle, large or small, my family takes dozens of WEFIEs but I didn't realize they had a name. They are posted on Facebook.

Got most of the way through today's offering, but finally gave up and looked up Ansari on my DirecTV Genie. Thumped my forehead when that gave me ELIZ. Didn't know anything about Jabberwocky, including its stanzas. Other unknowns were Baby MAMA, Rapa NUI and Lo MEIN.

Erased Excise for ESTATE and Kayes for ZALES. Wouldn't have gotten FASHION POLICE without the theme. I had three favorite clues - Leaderless for TIED, it often comes to those who wait for TIP, and leading characters in Mork and Mindy for EMS.

Even though I had to have help, I enjoyed JL`s puzzle and JzB`s write-up.

The Wednesday puzzle is usually the first one I work in the week, as Monday and Tuesday are not challenging. But it was a DNF today. I didn't know 1A or 1D and misspelled NUI as NUA. I correctly guessed STANZA but the _P HALL TASK got me.

PARS- I got my first one yesterday on the 6th hole, after one single, three doubles, and one triple BOGEY. Finally started playing okay with four more PARS, a snowman (8), and two rare (for me) birdies on the way to a 90.

Enjoyable puzzle today. Fabulous, detailed expo. Many thanks, Julian and Jazzbumpa. Liked the clue "It often comes to those who wait" for TIP, and agree with you, Jazz, that TIED for "leaderless" was tricky. Have never heard the term WEFIE. Nice to have a Julian Lim puzzle that I was able to finish without help.

Actually SUPER G and CONAIR (Air Force) are also starred and part of the theme.We are shutting down soon for the hurricane, so be well all. Hopefully I will have some power somewhere for Friday. All in Matthew's cone- be safe

Got the theme as I was finishing, but didn't need it. Sometimes have trouble with Julian's offerings, but not today. No searches needed. Only erasure was in getting the spelling of GUYANA right.Favorite clue was for TIP.

Did not Like 26 A. Its ELIZABETH THE SECOND. I wrote in QEII (25% correct) at first.

Did not like TRADE = DISCIPLINE either. In this context, a TRADE requires specialized knowledge, but has a clear implication that it is something you get paid to do (unless you work for the Donald, perhaps). DISCIPLINE refers to a specialized branch of knowledge in higher education, not the thing you get paid for.

Yes, going out on a Lim with Julian was cause for hesitation today,but it is a Wednesday puzzle, so I thought I had a chance.

In the end, FIW.( I spelt/spelled Guiana wrong...)(really kicking myself for not getting NyPD)but I was sidetracked by Super G (never heard of it)and 1d SVU. Thought both were wrong but the perps were right.Totally distracted me from where I actually went wrong...

What Lucina said. I found this one less daunting than the usual Julian, and I didn't know there was a name for that group photo.

Our local symphony orchestra is directed by a particularly energetic man with a big personality. He's a hoot. One of his signature actions is posing with a soloist in front of the whole orchestra for a cell phone "wefie" - a thoroughly modern thing to do, and a good way to dilute some of the traditional stuffiness we associate with the Symphony world.

Yes, my tea made it again. EARL Grey. D-O remembered. I see Jazz likes it as well. It is the best!

Puzzle was a little tougher than I expected. Lots of inkblots. Especially when I started to write in ENCYCLOPEDIA for 47A. Got it all in except for the last letter. That is when I realized it was wrong. So, eventually REFERENCE WORK made the grade.

Wrote in ISLAM before ALLAH. Did not read carefully. Noticed JEW right next to ALLAH. That is where they are in the middle east as well, right next to each other.

Well, I didn't quite make it, but it was a Julian Lim puzzle, and still a bit of a toughie for me. I had GAYANA and that kept me from getting JEALOUS. But it was still fun and I did get the theme. And I liked your expo, JazzB.

I agree with what all of you said about this Julian Lim work, including nits and favorite clues.

About MEIN: Mien (also spelled myan, pronounced like "man" with the "y" sound between the m and the a) means noodles in Chinese. I don't know why it is spelled mein in English, perhaps because English speakers pronounce it as "main." Anyway, chow mian means fried noodles and lo mian means boiled noodles. Please pardon my spellings; there have been several methods for Romanizing Chinese sounds over the years and I confess I am not very familiar with the latest, official Pinyin. If I were, I would spell chow as cao, which would be of no help to non-Chinese speakers. (Heck, spelling chow as cao, chee as qi, and so forth, confuses the crap out me, and I honestly don't like it.)

Musings-I needed the reveal but was entertained on the way-Is there anything more trivial than FASHION POLICE?-A teacher who DRONES on with no VISUAL aids in should be fired-Hitler annexed Austria but SIEZED Poland-A swing-from-the-heels PAR 5 for me is a ho-hum PAR 4 for the pros-What, Jazz, you’ve never heard, “I want to AXE you a -A meatpacking plant in Colorado just fired hundreds of Mosque Goers who needed to stop and pray to ALLAH five times/day, twice while the production line was moving-I have to GIRD my loins to face Kindergartners!-Seeing MALALA again is great because she is a hero of mine-Eddie Murphy ALIBI, “I was not picking up a transvestite prostitute, I was just offering a hooker a ride home”-The sports language is “The REF will TACK ON 15 yds for that personal foul”-When I have kids dissect a chicken wing, they are giddy when they can make the “flipper” move by pulling on exposed TENDONS-There is really no such thing as SUCTION. It is just high-pressure fluid pushing toward a low-pressure area.

My Xwd, my tutor."Who knew?" Exactly, Jzbmpa! Who knew that a WEFIE was a real thing? After filling it, I checked with my wife who is knowledgeable in ways I am not. She had to confess ignorance too, but now we are both that much wiser. Let's see: In February of 2010 there were exactly 1,033,322 words in the English language, with a new word coined every 98 minutes. I don't think it requires TRIG to calculate how many English words we had as of 11 am PDT on 5 Oct 2016, but in Ol' Keith's household it was bumped up by a factor of... Lessee now... a factor - of ...Thank you, Mr. Lim.

I was just going to state the same. Especially in the specialized language (argot) of education, perhaps.

Didn't need an abbrv indicator for TRIG because it is already implied. TRIG, Calc, Psych 101, etc. One of the first school related ones we all may have might have been PhysEd. I would surmise that pretty much everyone knows they are abbreviations.

JzB, yeah, I was disappointed when they didn't quite make the cut. My Pirates were out of contention weeks and weeks ago. OK, a couple of months ago. Good to hear Ausmus kept his job.

I just want to comment on Sunday's puzzle. It was great fun and though I knew only about half the Beatles songs, I liked recalling them. My favorite clue was 2D, POE embedded in POEM. Great stuff from Patti and Thomas Bianchi. Thank you, both! C.C., I really enjoyed your commentary. It was sparkling and you seemed relaxed which if you're usually not, it's understandable given your schedule. The comments from the all you Bloggers was really entertaining!

Not going to get into the "SUCTION" debate ...Just know that at times @ Villa Incognito ... when Gal-Pal visits ...

Fave today was ALIBI ... a 90 proof whiskey that was on sale at $ 7.99 for a 750 liter bottle at B-21 ... the liquor store 160 steps from my front door.(Dang, I need a phone with GPS to locate a liquor store near by ... LOL!)